Devices and Desires (Adam Dalgliesh Mystery Series #8)

by P. D. James

Paperback, 2002

Status

Available

Call number

823.914

Publication

Warner Books (2002), Paperback, 448 pages

Description

Fiction. Literature. Mystery. HTML:National Bestseller. Featuring the famous Commander Adam Dalgliesh, Devices and Desires is a thrilling and insightfully crafted novel of fallible people caught in a net of secrets, ambitions, and schemes on a lonely stretch of Norfolk coastline. Commander Dalgliesh of Scotland Yard has just published a new book of poems and has taken a brief respite from publicity on the remote Larksoken headland on the Norfolk coast in a converted windmill left to him by his aunt. But he cannot so easily escape murder. A psychotic strangler of young women is at large in Norfolk, and getting nearer to Larksoken with every killing. And when Dalgliesh discovers the murdered body of the Acting Administrative Officer on the beach, he finds himself caught up in the passions and dangerous secrets of the headland community and in one of the most baffling murder cases of his career.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member benfulton

Not sure if I actually read the same book as all the other reviewers. Certainly the focus is more on characterization and less on gently doling out clues so the reader can solve the mystery, but that is a positive of the book. Has the irritating, showy quality of the detective finding the body

himself - I always hate those sorts of coincidences, but I suppose it was the easiest way to get Dalgliesh involved in a case where he was so far out of his jurisdiction.

The characters are drawn lushly, not only as characters but as people with good motives for murder. One character does combine cunning and strength of character with an almost ludicrous naivete. When I found out the identity of the murderer, I didn't find it to be particularly surprising or predictable, but I thought the way the murderer was revealed to the reader was superbly written, and the murderer's fate was perfectly in character, neatly foreshadowed, and had nice historical touches.

I haven't read all that many of P.D. James's books, but this one might have been my favorite so far.

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LibraryThing member NellieMc

I decided to read all of the Adam Daigliesh mysteries in one fell swoop and am glad I did. First, they are classic British mysteries all well-deserving of the respect P.D. James has earned for them and all are a good read. However, what is interesting is to watch the author develop her style from

the early ones to the later ones. And, in fact, A Shroud for a Nightingale and The Black Tower (the fourth and fifth in the series) is where she crosses the divide. The later books have much more character development -- both for the players and the detectives -- make Dalgleish more rounded and are generally much more than a good mystery yarn -- they're fine novels that happen to be mysteries. The first three books (Cover Her Face, A Mind to Murder, Unnatural Causes) are just that much more simplistic. But read any or all -- she's a great writer and they are definitely worth the time.

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LibraryThing member Coach_of_Alva

I hadn't read an Adam Dalgliesh novel in ten years when I started this. I feared I would find it more sobering than entertaining and I was right. P. D. James writes mysteries that have all the qualities of a serious realist novel: grim detail, much of it psychological, little humor, no conscious

parody or camp. She is a very facile writer: characters, places, situations, motivations are described in detail in the classic realist manner. She is adequate at mystery and better at suspense. She has here two horrific scenes of violence that are hard to forget. She has one fault I can't stand. Everybody in the book talks like an Eton graduate. When a frigging tramp started talking like everyone, I nearly threw the book against the wall.

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LibraryThing member Crowyhead

This was a good mystery, but it just doesn't hang together as well as the other James mysteries I've read recently. My main problem was a red herring that appeared rather late in the book with very little warning, which struck me as being somewhat unbelievable and needlessly dramatic. Overall the

novel felt overly long and overly confusing, without the same kind of tight plotting that I've come to expect from James.

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LibraryThing member annbury

Classic Brit mystery -- a limited number of people in a confined place, every one of them with a motive. This isn't my favorite of hers, but it's still first rate.

LibraryThing member nbmars

Devices and Desires involves an off-duty trip to the East Anglian countryside for Adam Dalgliesh, the Scotland Yard Commander who is known for his intelligence, photographic memory, and perceptiveness. A local serial killer case is not his responsibility, nor are the seemingly implicated politics

of the local nuclear power plant, but Dalgliesh nevertheless becomes involved. This satisfying James effort includes the usual complement of elevated language and memorable phrases. One favorite: the local inspector, thinking about the forensic pathologist, observes, "Reading M.B.'s lucid and comprehensive autopsy reports, he could forgive him even his aftershave." The heart of this crime - and indeed - any crime, is captured by a witness who, struggling to understand evil, asks a priest, "Can we ever break free of the devices and desires of our own hearts?" (The priest, meanwhile, wants to return to his mystery book, because the detective therein "despite his uncertainties, would get there in the end, because this was fiction: problems would be solved, evil overcome, justice vindicated and death itself only a mystery which would be solved in the final chapter.") This is typical James: the "meta" commentary - tongue-in-cheek one presumes - on her own situation. "The dead," says one of James' characters, "have passed beyond the power of words." Luckily, we - her readers - have not.

(JAF)

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LibraryThing member idiotgirl

Listened to as an audiobook. Odd visual image flashbacks as I listened, so I must have seen this on PBS as well. Enjoyed James, as I always do. This one has an interesting twist because Adam D isn't the detective. He has to remain to quite an extent on the periphery. I was struck this time about

how much James lets you into the conciouscness of all the characters and still keeps her secret about who done it. And I never really try to guess. I like the pleasure of not knowing in a mystery.

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LibraryThing member m.a.harding

Good topics but dull. The detective doesn't do anything and doesn't tell the reader anything. Stuff happends.

LibraryThing member SeriousGrace

It begins with a serial killer stalking lone women up and down the coast of Norfolk, England. Commander Adam Dalgliesh is trying to take a holiday in nearby, sleepy Larksoken where his aunt has willed him a quaint windmill/cottage. His vacation is cut short when the killer takes one of Larsoken's

own. Adding to the drama is a highly controversial atomic power station, a lover's tryst and blackmail. Dalgliesh does his best to assist the local authorities but there is controversy even there as he has a not so pleasant history with Rickards, the lead on the case.
As with all small towns the entire community is well embroiled in each other's lives. They seem to know everything about one another yet no one suspects the real killer.

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LibraryThing member MarkKeeffe

I like Dalgleish crime books and this one was as good as any.

LibraryThing member hugh_ashton

I find P.D.James to be a strange writer. In some ways, she is excellent – she has a good grasp of what makes a certain class of person tick, and the relationships that exist in British society. I was re-reading this – though I find Adam Dalgliesh to be a rather irritating protagonist, for

reasons I am not wholly sure of, the sweep of the stories carries me along, and the East Anglian settings always appeal. But at the same time that the stories are good, they often involve a heavy dash of willing suspension of belief, and though life is sometimes stranger than fiction, the coincidences sometimes come too fast and furious for realistic comfort.

One thing I noticed is that P.D.James and I write in rather similar ways – not that I put myself in the same league as her, but the faults I notice in her writing are ones I notice in my own. Her characters talk in whole perfectly rounded sentences, somewhat unnaturally, but expressing their thoughts clearly through their words – so do mine. Her characters also talk to themselves (without punctuation) – and so do mine. As I say, her plots are more coherent and better than mine, but there are similarities in the way we treat characters. I am not sure why Dalgliesh irritates me - maybe for the same reasons that he irritates himself.

Anyway, Devices and Desires is one of the more enjoyable escapist ways of passing an evening

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LibraryThing member ablueidol

Crime novels not usually my cup of tea. Either because they work best on TV such as Miss Marples et al or Inspector Morse or because you know by the plot by the 2nd page. She like a handful of others such as the very different Elmore John Leonard create via their writing a world in which the moral

actions of their characters make sense

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LibraryThing member Condorena

Not one of her best, but intriguing considering the fact that the back story is about a nuclear power plant and they are much in the news these days.

LibraryThing member thorold

Good solid middle-period P.D. James murder mystery. Lots of East Anglian atmosphere - Norfolk not Suffolk for once - and maybe a bit too much plot, with the standard PDJ theme (murder of an unpleasantly pushy career-woman who’s made an implausible number of enemies) being obfuscated by two other

big plot-threads, one about a serial killer and the other about the safety of nuclear power. All very elegantly woven together, in the best possible taste, so that it's difficult even to work up much irritation about the author’s all too familiar right-wing prejudices.

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LibraryThing member AliceAnna

James' breakaway from the pure British cozy format. Much better than some of her earlier works. Conveys the horror of violent death on several levels.

LibraryThing member christinejoseph

good mystery Adam Dalgliesh goes to London countryside + gets involved in a murder - Nuclear Station, Whistler, etc.

Commander Dalgliesh of Scotland Yard has just published a new book of poems and has taken a brief respite from publicity on the remote Larksoken headland in a converted windmill left

to him by his aunt. But he cannot so easily escape murder. A psychotic strangler of young women is at large, and getting nearer to Larksoken with every killing. And when Dalgliesh discovers the murdered body of the Acting Administrative Officer on the beach, he finds himself caught up in the passions and dangerous secrets of the headland community and in one of the most baffling murder cases of his career.

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LibraryThing member antao

“’The victim's hair was damp, which suggests she died after her swim and not before it’"

In “Devices and Desires” by P. D. James

I’m no detective but that is some incredible deduction Dalgliesh…

I'm only going to be on this earth for a limited amount of time, and in all likelihood I

won't manage in that time to get through all the great books that have ever been written. But I should at least try my best to. I only re-read books if it's so long since I read them that I barely remember them at all, (and even then it's rare). My bookshelves are heaving with books, and I buy them quicker than I read them, so I've got to try my hardest to keep up. And I certainly can't help thinking that if one is re-reading the same book every year, one could do with broadening our horizons a bit. Nevertheless, re-reading should be adopted by all serious readers. Last year I went through some of my favourite SF books of all-time, and what a joyous ride it’s been. Unfortunately that particular objective kept me away from reading some new stuff coming out. Moreover, to re-read a good book lifts the soul, but to re-read one twice or more puts authors on the dole….lol.

Now that spring is here and summer is just around the corner (the temperature here right now is 29ºC…), it’s time to decide what to read. Why summer? Because summer is the season when some people read books, you smugly. Flat on your back in the hotel bedroom you'll watch dumbfounded as your wife assembles a great leaning tower of books, and leaves you lying there alone. Your friend Saramago will tell you he's casually re-reading “Anna Karenina” - time to hide folks! The most common use of the expression is simply to show off, that you are so clever that you re-read. No-one talks about reading tin labels. But some people who re-read books are not well read at all, because they've only read Shakespeare (it’s me I’m talking about). Another reason someone might re-read a book is because they haven't understood it from the blurb the first time (this is also me I’m talking about). This is criminal. So think twice before not re-reading this summer. As for me, I'll be re-re-[…]-reading "Devices and Desires" again any time soon.

Bottom-line: Knew about P.D. James' work when I borrowed one of her books in The British Council Lisbon's library way back in the late 80s. I got hooked ever since.

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LibraryThing member rafram

Commander Adam Dalgliesh of Scotland Yard goes to Larksoken, Norfolk to sort out the cottage he has inherited from his late aunt. On a walk, he finds the body of Hillary Robarth, Acting Administrative Officer of the local nuclear power plant. A serial killer known as “The Whistler” has

committed several murders in the area and this one has the same m.o. Dalgliesh helps local police with the investigation.

I listened to the audio edition of Devises and Desires, published by BBC Worldwide Ltd. It is number 8 in the (Adam Dalgliesh Mysteries) series by P.D. James. We follow Commander Adam Dalgliesh of Scotland Yard as he goes to Larksoken in Norfolk to clear out his late aunt’s cottage he has recently inherited. Acting Administrative Officer of the local nuclear power plant Hillary Robarth is found strangled on the beach close to Dalgliesh’s cottage. This is made to look like one of “The Whistler”’s works, but it’s a copycat. “The Whistler” was already dead at the time of the murder.

Devises and Desires was first published in 1989, 3 years after the Tsjernobyl nuclear disaster. The exciting and relevant plot includes nuclear and environmental issues which was very real and present in people’s minds at the time and is engagingly dealt with in the plot.

Main character is Scotland Yard Commander Adam Dalgliesh is the analytical character who manages to help tie up all lose ends in this story. As a hero he comes across as slightly quiet, but seems very dependable and stable. One I could put my trust in. He is my favorite of the story.

Secondary character Dr Alex Mare is Director at the nuclear plant. He had an affair with the victim 3-4 months ago, which seems to have not quite ended. He strung the victim along ever since, while having a new affair with the wife of a local environmental activist. I find him really unsympathetic and my least favorite in this story.

My favorite part of this story was the entertaining and enjoyable way the dialogue was acted out by British actors. It felt reminiscent of a radio play where I could make out the visuals myself.

P.D. James managed to include a mix of issues like environmental extremism, blackmail, adultery, gay-lesbian and suicide among others. There were quite a few twists along the way so my suspicions went in a different direction. The ending was a complete surprise to me.

The audio edition of Devises and Desires, is the exciting #8 installment in the (Adam Dalgliesh Mysteries) series by P.D. James. The plot has a nuclear and environmental theme highly relevant today and the audio edition was expertly acted out by British actors. I enjoy P.D. James’ work so much; I am on a quest to pick up on the remaining ones I have not yet read.
Fans of P.D. James will enjoy this work, as will readers of crime fiction. Similar authors to explore might be Elizabeth George or Colin Dexter.
Thank you to Kristiansand Folkebibliotek for lending me the audio edition which gave me the opportunity to share my honest review. All opinions are completely my own.

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